In Defense of Bieber Doing It His Way

It has been a little over a week since Justin Bieber headlined the Coachella main stage for the first time, and predictably, the chronically online found a way to make it about themselves. The fringe-flipping pop star turned moody R&B crooner ran a career-spanning 90-minute set built on fan requests and a YouTube singalong, and a certain breed of self-appointed critic called it lazy.

Then weekend two happened. Billie Eilish, one of the biggest artists alive, dropped to her knees mid-stage while Bieber serenaded her with "One Less Lonely Girl," a lifelong Belieber barely holding it together in front of the entire world.

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The main thesis criticizing Bieber is his supposed low-effort concept of noodling on his laptop, looking up old YouTube clips from his salad days. "Look at how much Sabrina Carpenter did" and "It was an overpriced PowerPoint presentation or karaoke session" are just some of the quips against the headlining artist's performance and how it's seemingly underproduced against his contemporaries.

One thing we have to wrap our heads around is that Bieber, whether you like him or not, is a generational talent with a career already spanning nearly 20 years. He isn't Sabrina Carpenter or an entire K-pop group that relies heavily on spectacle to convey his work.

The Canadian superstar went beyond what was expected of him, with apprehensions about him potentially flaking on the headlining spot never really leaving until he actually took the stage. Those dismissing his set as a letdown missed the entire point of the stripped-down throwback sonic soliloquy with his younger self. Only a few of the people quick to chime in on the supposed laziness of a stuck-up superstar actually watched his performance in its entirety, reducing it to the 20-minute YouTube excursion.

His massive collaborations with masters of the contemporary glitchy, gritty alternative music space, Dijon and MK.gee, coming to life at Coachella rarely see the light of day in the headlines. "Devotion" with Dijon, for example, saw the two singers trading raspy vocals with enough soul to contort faces into the musical stank face reserved for truly mind-bending performances.

A lot of people don't even know that the chart-topping "Daisies," the biggest song off his comeback record Swag, has the fuzzy wizardry of MK.gee to thank. Most people probably wouldn't have known who the long-haired artist with the noisy Fender Jaguar was, the one who brought a lot of Bieber's biggest recent tracks to life alongside the surging Dijon. A musical trio firing on all cylinders and an incredibly exciting era of music that the industry desperately needs.

The laptop thing is a spiritual gesture from the Canadian, who posted his first covers, including renditions of "With You" by Chris Brown and "So Sick" by Ne-Yo, under the Kidrauhl YouTube account. Karaoke-ing his biggest hits, many of which are still favorites on the airwaves, was far from Bieber phoning it in or giving the fans the middle finger. It's hard to believe he's been at the whole pop star thing for so long that piping-hot alternative groups like Geese are covering his most popular song, "Baby," at the same gig.

The madness of casually typing up his teenybopper hits, his "Standing on Business" altercation, and now-ancient memes like the "Deez Nuts" guy and the "Double Rainbow" guy being enough to tug on every single heartstring is a testament to his undeniable staying power. It would have been more disingenuous for him to go the over-the-top, flashing-lights-and-backflips route. He gave us the standout Swag cuts and sang bar for bar through the purple-hued favorites via YouTube, many recorded when he was just a kid from Ontario, Canada.

The poignancy of Bieber's performance was him earnestly connecting with everyone who has followed him on his rocky journey into stardom, especially coming on the heels of his recent mental health struggles. Bieber gave us the Coachella finale on his own purposeful terms, and it's plain silly to dismiss the entire stroll down nostalgia and him bearing what still makes him a compelling artist in an attention-deprived generation.

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